Inside the Braves with MLB.com's Mark Bowman

Braves to employ right-handed lineup on Wednesday

I’ll write something more extensive when I get back upstairs. But for now, I thought you’d be interested to see the lineup that Rockies left-hander Jorge De La Rosa will be facing tonight.

Braves manager Bobby Cox has constructed a right-handed heavy lineup against the Rockies left-hander, who has limited left-handed hitters to a .130 (6-for-46) batting average this year. Right-handed hitters are batting .252 (28-for-111) against him.

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58 Comments

Bobby sees the need for change and he has certainly changed up the lineup the last two nights. Neither one of those batting averages against the Rockies lefty is very good. I wonder why his record isn’t better. Anyway, I see that Francouer has been moved to 6 so maybe by some miracle he will get a hit tonight. I wouldn’t bet on it.
What I like is that the Braves manager is not complacent and he’s becoming more aggressive and hands-on in his style.

Ugh…I can feel a 1-0 loss today with this line-up. I hope and pray I’m wrong…. At least put Ross in the 4th spot. Chipper will be walked 3 times today with Prado hitting behind him.http://darion.mlblogs.com/

I like Prado a lot but having him bat cleanup speaks volumes about the lack of power on this club. What a joke. Also, it is time to either bench Francoeur or send him to the minors for half a season. He is back to having no clue at the plate again and his lack of production is killing this team.

Are you kidding me? Do lefty vs righty matchups mean that much? This lineup is terrible! It looks like we have put in almost our entire second string tonight. The Phillies keep winning, so I guess Bobby thought we should lose one so we can fall back a little more in the East.

What the Braves need is pretty much a 2 year rental outfielder. Look our infield is Chipper – Escobar – Johnson – Kotchman. Its actually a very good infield despite what many of you think. Anyways back to my point. We have an great array of outfield prospects (G. Hernandez, Schaffer, Heyward) That will be the 2011 outfield. We need a big bat that we will only need for a couple of years, but can’t give up prospects. And that is very hard. We need someone like J. Dye or Nick Markakus, but that will never happen. And the reason why so many teams trade at the trade deadline is so that they get as much of use out of that player. (I thought I’d never have to say that).

Also, I still believe we should get a “Gap Hitter” as opposed to a “Power Hitter” just because it make more sence at the Ted. Derosa would be an ok solution if we traded Jo Jo & Morton for him. And traded Francour for some low – middle level prospect. And haved Derosa in Right Field. But Derosa makes 5.5M in 2009, which is more than what we have even with the 3M freed up from Frenchys contract. (I believe)

Are you kidding me? Do lefty vs righty matchups mean that much? This lineup is terrible! It looks like we have put in almost our entire second string tonight. The Phillies keep winning, so I guess Bobby thought we should lose one so we can fall back a little more in the East.

—————————————————————————————————————Yes its does, If the batter has the advantage he has a 10% better chance of getting a hit. (Thats an extra .100 points on a batting average)

Brilliant. The 2 LH hitters that hit lefties better than righties (Kotchman and KJ) sit versus a lefty. And the one who doesn’t have a prayer against lefties (Schafer) is in the line-up. Just brilliant. I can understand McCann getting the day off because he’s a catcher, but the rest of the replacements make no sense. (I consider Diaz a platoon player, so not a replacement). Wake up, Bobby.

That’s why it’s called “experimenting” with the lineup. More than half of Prado’s hits are for extra bases and he’s hitting .295. And he doesn’t strike out. And Infante is hitting .350 against lefties.

Anyone up for signing Jim Edmonds? He is available. Heck I’ll take Bonds if he can hit 20 home runs and will play for league minimum. I’ll even be the first to buy a Bonds jersey as long as we don’t have Prado or Anderson hitting clean-up

Hey, I’m not happy that we’re in a position to even use Prado in the cleanup spot. But we’re 2.5 games back BECAUSE OF THE OFFENSE. That’s when you experiment. When you score 0 runs against the last place team and 1 against the next to last place team something has to be mixed up.

I understand you vivabeta, but we shouldn’t have to be dealing with this this early. I *gulp!* think it’s time to *cry a little tear* let Bobby go. He was great, but I just think it’s past his time. I think it’s time to call up his old friend Ned Yost. Please don’t call me crazy for saying this, but after this season, he’s got to go. There is no way he gets fired in the season because people would go crazy.

I hope I’m proven wrong, but this lineup doesn’t give me any confidence that Vazquez will get any run support to get his first win at Turner Field this year. Prado batting cleanup with McCann out doesn’t really bother me, as he does hit for a pretty good average, and we don’t have many other options. I do agree with the poster PWH (5:51) that Kotchman and Johnson who hit better against lefties should not be sitting. As for Francouer/Schafer, I’m really disappointed in their play so far. Both are excellent defensively, but how much defense are we going to exchange for lack of offense? Defense doesn’t do you a whole lot of good if you can’t score folks. We’ve got to find a way to make a trade somewhere to get us some more power. Our outfield is the joke of MLB when it comes to hitting ability.

OK. As I was composing a new entry to see if some of you now liked the right-handed lineup, the Braves kept scoring to the point that the desk asked for a sider. So I’ll compose something postgame talking about who the Braves would most likely trade. Previewing, Kelly Johnson is the most expendable player who is definitely valued outside this organization. As for Francoeur, just like last year, the Braves are going to have trouble finding potential suitors.

Entering tonight, the Braves had scored a total of 20 fourth-inning runs…Their previous season-high inning totals occurred on April 8, when they tallied five hits in a five-run fourth inning against the Phillies, who as you likely recall came back to win that game with an eight-run seventh inning….Tonight’s nine-run fourth was totaled with six hits (one extra-base hit, four walks and one hit batter.

My assumption is that Chipper just hit the showers after the Braves gained this sizable advantage. I didn’t notice anything unusual tonight. After his first at-bat last night, it seemed like he favored his right side. But he remained in the game, took batting practice today and didn’t seem to be too bothered by the discomfort. I’ll let you know if I hear more.

That big inning should give Vazquez his first home win. But more importantly, it allowed him to experience a relatively stress-free 71 pitch outing. He had thrown at least 107 pitches during each of his previous three outings.

Experimenting with the lineup. There you go.
I see there were a lot of walks, but still 12 hits and as I write this, Schafer got another RBI. But you know.. I’m sure Bobby will do something that someone thinks is stupid in the next week or so to have a few people calling him a moron and/or wanting him gone.

Why yes he did neverwhere. I think everyone else on here is as blown away as you…so much for a make shift lineup…something must have clicked in bobby’s mind over night because he is making himself look like a genius!!!

Infante broke the fifth metacarpal on his left hand. The Braves say that he’ll be further evaluated by a hand specialist tomorrow. I’m not a doctor, but I can only gather that he’s going to be out for a significant period. This obviously alters those thoughts about trading Johnson.

Oh and Btw, Bobby shut up all stupid fair-weather fans. This win belongs to him. Also, Derosa and Roberts ARE NOT OPTIONS!!! I don’t think people understand the amount of money we have, DeRosa makes 5M and Roberts makes 8M.

Back to Infante, He sure is a great player but he is a backup, ok? Losing a starter sucks, This just HAS TO be the last injury until he gets back, and if its not, then it sucks.
Everyone just calm down. As, for leadoff I dont think we should put Kelly there he showed how will he hits in the 6th spot…Keep him there. Lets all just have a little faith in Bobby. And as always… GO BRAVES!!!

Mark DeRosa makes so much sense right now. We need him in the outfield and when he want to let Diaz or Anderson play in left, he can play in the infield. He is an Infante with more power. He even lives in Atlanta! I’m sure he would love to go back to where it started.

jurrjens4nlcy,
You do not work for the Braves front office. You and I and everyone else here has NO CLUE how much money the Braves have to spend. So let’s not pretend we know. Because we don’t. Roberts isn’t an option because he’s Baltimore’s franchise player and just signed a big contract extension, there’s no reason they’re going to do the work to sign him long-term then turn around and trade him. DeRosa, on the other hand, is in his walk year and both him and the Indians have no mutual loyalty, so he may be an option. He doesn’t have the full 5 million left, by the way. He’s got about 3.8 million left.

I think it’s time to move Schafer into the lead-off spot, move Garret Anderson/Matt Diaz to 8th and Kelly Johnson to 5th/6th. It makes sense with Omar gone.
DeRosa has a little less than 5 million left. We can also free up some salary as well.

PWHjort,
I remeber during this offseason the reason why we were so stingy in Glavine’s contract was because we had like 1.5M left or something like that. Also, I don’t understand why people think DeRosa is the solution for our problems. Granted he is what I wanted in a gap hitter rather than power, but he just seems like another Prado

I agree moving Shafer into the leadoff. Show him that we still have faith in him. He’s been doing a lot better the past couple of games. Minus the 3 K’s tonight he has brought those down. If anything, moving him into the leadoff, he can’t get out much more than he is and it moves KJ into his normal/comfortable position so he can hit like he’s capable of. Who knows, Shafer might even pick it up another notch and start to do more of his potential. Big win tonight, big loss with Omar, but that can’t slow them down.

DeRosa has a little bit more power and can play just about every position, just like Infante, but he is a starter. I am hoping we trade Matt Diaz and just have an Anderson-DeRosa Left Field. DeRosa bats right-handed so it works out perfectly.

The Indians want pitching for him though, and I’ll admit after researching (which is a beautiful thing) DeRosa sounds fine. They want starting pitchers who can help them now, I’m gunna get my hopes up and say Kawakami for DeRosa, Ohh that would rock. Maybe DeRo for Medlen or maybe Morton and Jo Jo (who CAN pitch).

The Indians want pitching for him though, and I’ll admit after researching (which is a beautiful thing) DeRosa sounds fine. They want starting pitchers who can help them now, I’m gunna get my hopes up and say Kawakami for DeRosa, Ohh that would rock. Maybe DeRo for Medlen or maybe Morton and Jo Jo (who CAN pitch).

The Indians want pitching for him though, and I’ll admit after researching (which is a beautiful thing) DeRosa sounds fine. They want starting pitchers who can help them now, I’m gunna get my hopes up and say Kawakami for DeRosa, Ohh that would rock. Maybe DeRo for Medlen or maybe Morton and Jo Jo (who CAN pitch).

The Indians want pitching for him though, and I’ll admit after researching (which is a beautiful thing) DeRosa sounds fine. They want starting pitchers who can help them now, I’m gunna get my hopes up and say Kawakami for DeRosa, Ohh that would rock. Maybe DeRo for Medlen or maybe Morton and Jo Jo (who CAN pitch).

My guess would be that Blanco would be called up from AAA with the loss of Infante. He’s struggling down there, but unless Atlanta thinks Brandon Jones could handle center or that Brian Barton would be a better option it’ll be Blanco. Prado would then slot into primary back-up at 3rd, SS, 2b, Norton would probably slot as 1B on nights where Bobby wants to maximize righties. Not ideal, but I don’t see any IF’s that would naturally be stronger fits at AAA right now.

Just posted a new entry talking about the effects of Infante’s injury. Diory Hernandez will be up tomorrow to take Infante’s roster spot. Matt Diaz and Martin Prado are going to attempt to acquaint themselves with the CF position early tomorrow afternoon. Like I said earlier, Reyes’ left hamstring injury makes it easy for the Braves to decide what move to make to create room for Medlen. But even if he hadn’t suffered the injury that could put him on the DL, it seemed certain that Reyes was destined to be sent back to Gwinnett.

Mark, what do you think of the Hernandez call-up? I’m a bit surprised by that decision only because he’s already got 9 errors this season at AAA. It’s not that I figured Blanco made anymore sense, but it really seemed like we were lacking any reliable IF replacement. Seems like this injury may force the Braves to make some sort of deal to get through the next 2 months.

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